I've been MIA for a couple of days, despite having promised to update you on the Sinterklaas surprise and food.
Something to do with a somewhat broken car, a lot of pain in my neck making me lose sleep, and annoying stuff with GP, insurance, pharmacist and rheumatologist making me not up for posting.
First, thank you for all your lovely compliments on my surprise!
It did survive the ride over there, and I must have annoyed the heck out of at least 25 drivers by taking roundabouts and bumps at 3 miles an hour, going from 0 to 60 in 5 minutes, and starting to slow down way before taking corners.
I received wonderful poems and a yucky surprise myself, having to search for my presents in a cardboard WC filled with a mixture of gingerbread and water. My friend greatly enjoyed buying 5 loaves of gingerbread for a diabetic, without it messing with my BG.

I also had to follow a trail in the rain to find my surprise!
Food was wonderful: First an adaptation of low carb tuna melt muffins made with smoked salmon. Dangerously delicious! Forgot to make a picture though. Then a roll up thing of carrot with salmon and cream cheese, can also recommend. Both of those were made by my friend.
Main course was mussels cooked in wine with some onion, celery, leek and garlic, with various mayo based dipping sauces. A mustard sauce, a lemon sauce, a garlic sauce and an experimental Branston pickle and mayo sauce with some extra lemon for zing.
My friend comes from Germany originally, and during the meal we found out that the Dutch and Flemings have their mussels with (usually mayo or vinegar based) sauces, while the Germans don't usually dip their mussels.
So now I have two questions:
- Do people in the UK dip their mussels?
- Is mixing Branston with mayo a thing or did I just invent a very tasty dipping sauce? (No Branston in my country, my pot was brought from the UK.)
And for completeness, I had cauliflower cheese with fried onion and chorizo today and yesterday.
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